Afghanistan News February 14, 2008


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February 14, 2008

Pneumonia spreads as winter deaths top 800
KABUL, 14 February 2008 (IRIN) - Over 170,000 patients with pneumonia and other acute respiratory infections have been diagnosed and treated at health centres across Afghanistan in the past month, the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) has reported.

Iran deports Afghans despite call for winter halt
AFP, 02/14/2008
KABUL - Kabul is seeking an urgent meeting with Teheran about the deportation of Afghans, the government said on Wednesday, with 7,000 forced out in the past month despite a pledge to halt expulsions over winter.

MPs say Karzai could alienate Britons
By Avril Orms February 14, 2008
LONDON (Reuters) - President Hamid Karzai is in danger of alienating British public commitment to Afghanistan if he continues to make outspoken comments, a group of politicians said on Thursday.

No problem between Britain, Afghanistan
AFP, 02/14/2008
KABUL - Afghanistan’s relationship with Britain is on track following a bumpy patch, President Hamid Karzai’s office said Thursday after British MPs voiced concern over recent diplomatic rows.

Several Taliban, two civilians killed in Afghanistan: officials
February 14, 2008
KABUL (AFP) - US-led coalition swoops on Taliban leaders left several insurgents dead while two civilians transporting construction materials were blown up by a rebel bomb, officials said Thursday.

France mulls greater Afghanistan role
By JAMEY KEATEN Associated Press Thu Feb 14, 3:26 AM ET
PARIS - In American military parlance, it's gut-check time for NATO in Afghanistan, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy appears ready to answer allies' calls for more forces to fight the Taliban and al-Qaida.

Report calls for more Afghan control of budget
Thu Feb 14, 12:37 AM ET
KABUL (AFP) - More than 70 percent of public expenditure in Afghanistan comes from donors and most is spent without government oversight, according to a report that calls for more accountability.

Pakistan Hunts for Envoy Missing Near Border With Afghanistan
By Ed Johnson
Feb. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Pakistan is hunting for its ambassador to Kabul who disappeared four days ago in a tribal region near the Afghan border, the Foreign Office said, adding nobody has claimed responsibility for abducting him.

Taliban denies kidnapping Pakistani envoy
Feb 13, 2008 06:08 EST
ISLAMABAD, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Pakistan's Taliban militants said on Wednesday they would not attack next week's general election and denied involvement in the disappearance of the country's ambassador to neighbouring Afghanistan.

Germany may increase Afghanistan troops: paper
BERLIN (Reuters) - Chancellor Angela Merkel's ruling coalition plans to discuss raising the upper limit on the number of troops Germany can send to Afghanistan under its parliamentary mandate, a paper reported on Thursday.

Friend of Pervez flees extremists in Afghanistan
By Jerome Starkey in Kabul The Independent (UK) Thursday, 14 February 2008
A journalist friend of the condemned student Sayed Pervez Kambaksh has fled Afghanistan fearing for his life, after an extremist mob threatened to kill him.

Afghans fall for women’s football
(FIFA.com) Thursday 14 February 2008
When German overseas coach Klaus Stark brought his Afghan women's national team to the Ruit Sports Academy outside Stuttgart for a late-January training camp, he must have felt he had entered a different world.

The Taliban: Kidnappng, Inc.
MSNBC / February 13, 2008
By NBC News' Iqbal Sapand in Kabul, Afghanistan and Carol Grisanti in Islamabad, Pakistan
Malalai Ishaqzai was anxious to tell her story.
"The Taliban kidnapped my 21-year-old son Mustafa," she said. "They demanded a ransom of $200,000 or else they said they would kill him," she told NBC News. "Then they ordered me to give up my job."
Liberals back away from compromise on troops
Party sends mixed signals a day after a deal with the Conservatives on the future role of the Kandahar battle group seemed in hand
CAMPBELL CLARK, From Thursday's Globe and Mail February 14, 2008
OTTAWA — The Liberals' position on Afghanistan became mired in confusion yesterday when the party's defence critic, Denis Coderre, suggested they want to withdraw the Canadian Forces' main battle group in Kandahar

Tories offer new Afghan role plan
February 14, 2008 – Toronto Star, ALLAN WOODS OTTAWA BUREAU
OTTAWA–The Conservative government is willing to sit down with the Liberals to co-write a motion to extend the Afghan mission, a senior government official says.

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Iran deports Afghans despite call for winter halt
AFP, 02/14/2008
KABUL - Kabul is seeking an urgent meeting with Teheran about the deportation of Afghans, the government said on Wednesday, with 7,000 forced out in the past month despite a pledge to halt expulsions over winter.

Iran has agreed to the meeting but a date has yet to be set, foreign ministry spokesman Sultan Ahmad Baheen told AFP.

The United Nations and Afghan officials say about 7,000 Afghans have been deported to Afghanistan since President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced a temporary halt in mid-January for ”humanitarian reasons.”

Most of the returnees are Afghans who were in Iran illegally to work.
Teheran had also told the government it would suspend the returns until the end of winter, Baheen said.

“We do not have the capacity to receive a mass return of Afghans,” he said. “We need to find a solution for those who have no documents.” “We are also insisting that all returns should be voluntary and with dignity.”

Some of those who had returned had been held in a camp at Safed Sang, between the Iranian town of Mashad and the border with Afghanistan, where the conditions were described as “very bad,” he said.

Iran estimates there are about 1.5 million Afghans illegally living within its borders with another 900,000 there as registered refugees.
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MPs say Karzai could alienate Britons
By Avril Orms February 14, 2008
LONDON (Reuters) - President Hamid Karzai is in danger of alienating British public commitment to Afghanistan if he continues to make outspoken comments, a group of politicians said on Thursday.

Political relations between the two countries have "slightly soured" they said, after a series of diplomatic spats including criticism of British forces working to defeat the Taliban and helping in the country's reconstruction.

"There is a risk that the tone and timing of recent comments by the government of Afghanistan which are critical of the UK could undermine British public support for the UK's long-term commitment to Afghanistan," the International Development Committee said in a report.

Relations should be a "spirited partnership rather than sparky", Committee Chairman Malcolm Bruce later said on BBC radio.

Karzai has questioned some of the policies adopted by British troops in Helmand province and last month rejected Paddy Ashdown, the former Liberal Democrat leader and EU envoy to Bosnia, for the post of senior U.N. envoy.

Relations were also strained when Afghanistan declared two men, including a Briton working for the EU, "persona non grata" after they were accused of meeting Taliban members.

More than 70 British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan.

"I think the combination of criticism of our forces from some while back in spite of recent successes, the rejection of Paddy Ashdown as an international coordinator and the expulsion of two diplomats who were actually working with Afghan authorities has created a slight sourness which really is not in the best interest," Bruce added.

Too many such comments could start to break the solidarity of the British people to commit forces and resources.

"It is more of a sort of surprise that President Karzai is not fully understanding that," he told BBC radio.

Co-operation is essential if the Taliban are to be defeated, he said.

"Of course he has the right to criticise, but at the end of the day he also has to recognise that if he wants the long-term commitment of the international community, criticism has to be measured."
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No problem between Britain, Afghanistan
AFP, 02/14/2008
KABUL - Afghanistan’s relationship with Britain is on track following a bumpy patch, President Hamid Karzai’s office said Thursday after British MPs voiced concern over recent diplomatic rows.

Kabul is confident in the relationship and working closely with the offices of Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Foreign Secretary David Miliband, who visited last week, a presidential spokesman said.

‘We had a bumpy road recently but we have moved on and are now working closely,’ spokesman Homayun Hamidzada told AFP.

He was reacting after the influential International Development Committee of the British parliament’s lower house voiced disappointment at reported remarks by Karzai that UK troops had worsened the security situation.

Karzai also rejected British politician and former Bosnia envoy Paddy Ashdown for the job of United Nations representative in Afghanistan.

‘We are concerned about the recent deterioration in political relations between the government of Afghanistan and the UK,’ said committee chairman Malcolm Bruce.

But Hamidzada said Kabul was not concerned.

‘At times we have differences of opinion with our partners, and that is normal, but at the end of the day we are working towards the same goal, bringing security, prosperity and development to Afghanistan,’ he said.

‘We appreciate the assistance we get and we look forward to working together with Britain and our other international partners to fight terrorism and bring peace and stability to Afghanistan.’

Britain has around 7,800 troops in Afghanistan, mostly in the restive southern province of Helmand, where they are engaged in intense fighting with Taleban insurgents.
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Several Taliban, two civilians killed in Afghanistan: officials
February 14, 2008
KABUL (AFP) - US-led coalition swoops on Taliban leaders left several insurgents dead while two civilians transporting construction materials were blown up by a rebel bomb, officials said Thursday.

Coalition troops moved into action on Wednesday against rebel leaders in the provinces of Uruzgan and Zabul, both in the south where Taliban violence is at its most severe and fed by a rampant opium trade.

A "number" of rebels were killed in the operation in Uruzgan, a coalition statement said.

It did not make clear if the targeted militant was among the dead. Three suspects were detained, it said a statement.

Six other people, one of them identified as a Taliban leader with ties to networks that bring foreign fighters into Afghanistan, were detained in the Zabul operation, it said.

Zabul shares a border with Pakistan, where Taliban and other Islamic extremists are said to have bases and training camps.

The ultra-Islamic Taliban movement, which governed Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001, confirmed it was behind the bomb that struck a truck delivering sand to a construction site in Helmand province, also in the south.

Spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi claimed the bomb killed 10 people working for the Afghan and international military.

But Helmand police chief, Mohammad Hussain Andiwal, said only two civilians were killed. The Taliban often exaggerate casualties caused by their attacks.

In Farah in the southwest, meanwhile, the provincial governor confirmed that seven men -- three Pakistanis and their four Afghan guards -- were freed on Wednesday after being captured at the weekend with 14 others on a hunting trip.

The 14 were freed Monday after being held for three days.

"Yesterday the seven remaining hostages were freed with the help of tribal elders and influentials.

"The seven include three Pakistani nationals residing in Arabic countries and their four Afghan guards," governor Ghulam Mohaidin Baluch said.

The foreigners had been working with a reconstruction project. The group was kidnapped by "a former local commander who is standing against the government and has links with (the) Taliban now," Baluch said.

Southern Afghanistan is plagued by violence linked to Taliban insurgents who are tied up with opium and heroin smugglers and corrupt officials.
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France mulls greater Afghanistan role
By JAMEY KEATEN Associated Press Thu Feb 14, 3:26 AM ET
PARIS - In American military parlance, it's gut-check time for NATO in Afghanistan, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy appears ready to answer allies' calls for more forces to fight the Taliban and al-Qaida.

As early as Thursday, Sarkozy's top brass is to present him with a variety of options, from sending special forces to more trainers for Afghan troops, a French military official told The Associated Press. He spoke on condition of anonymity, because the decisions will ultimately rest with Sarkozy.

Sarkozy isn't expected to announce a final decision until the NATO summit in Bucharest, Romania, in early April, which is shaping up as a litmus test of his commitment to the Atlantic alliance which has often had a rocky relationship with France.

For Sarkozy, it's a chance to put muscle where his mouth is. The pro-American French leader has been promising to turn the page from the era of predecessor Jacques Chirac, who in 2006 ordered 200 French special forces out of Afghanistan and was a major critic of the U.S.-led Iraq war.

The NATO mission, known as the International Security Assistance Force, is strained over Canada's demand for 1,000 troops from another ally to support its 2,500 in the increasingly violence-wracked region of Kandahar, in Afghanistan's south. Ottawa has said it will pull them out when its mandate ends next year if no one answers its call.

France has said it could not meet the Canadian requirement alone. But Sarkozy's hand-raising to boost the French role could give political cover to other, more-reluctant allies to chip in, too.

France has 1,500 troops in and around the Afghan capital, Kabul, providing security and training Afghan troops as part of the NATO mission. Another 400 are in the separate, U.S.-led Operation Enduring Freedom, a muscular effort to battle the Taliban and al-Qaida.

Last year the Taliban launched more than 140 suicide missions — the highest number since they were ousted from power by the U.S.-led invasion of 2001. Insurgency-related violence in 2007 killed a record 6,500 people, mostly militants, according to an Associated Press tally based on figures from Afghan and Western officials.

As a former interior minister, Sarkozy is intensely aware of the terror threat. A Sarkozy advisor speaking on condition of anonymity said the president believes France and its allies will "pay a very heavy price" in the West and Muslim worlds if Afghanistan falls back to the Taliban.

"This is 'our war,'" said Francois Heisbourg, head of the state-funded Foundation for Strategic Research think-tank. "It's not like Iraq. This isn't something that the Americans ... dragged their more-or-less willing partners into — some of them kicking and screaming."

"This is one in which we collectively decided that we have a stake."

French daily Le Figaro reported this week that military planners are looking at four options: Sending more trainers for Afghan soldiers in and around Kabul; backing up the Canadians in the south; providing reinforcements for the southwestern Helmand province and along the border with Iran where criminal groups thrive; and deploying more troops in the volatile tribal areas of eastern Afghanistan, where Taliban and al-Qaida militants hide along the Pakistan border.

French officials say many options are on the table, and it's far too early to specify what the president will decide.

"For the moment, no decision has been made," French Defense Minister Herve Morin told The AP. Asked whether the options in the Le Figaro article were correct, he replied: "No ... not really. We're going to have to look at it closely."

France, like many other NATO countries, says its options are limited in Afghanistan because its forces are already stretched thin around the world. Cmdr. Christophe Prazuck, a military spokesman, says France's total "projection capacity" is 20,000 troops.

If the often-delayed European Union force for Chad and the Central African Republic is fully deployed as expected in coming weeks, France will have some 13,000 deployed in five missions: Ivory Coast; Kosovo and Bosnia; Chad and the C.A.R.; Lebanon; and Afghanistan.

A Sarkozy move to send more forces to Afghanistan could also give him a chance to wrest American concessions to let Europe have a freer hand in strengthening its own defense.

The French argue that Western Europe's postwar dependency on the U.S. military partly explains the difficulties NATO faces in mustering extra forces from Europe for campaigns such as Afghanistan.
___
Associated Press Writer John Leicester contributed to this report.
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Report calls for more Afghan control of budget
Thu Feb 14, 12:37 AM ET
KABUL (AFP) - More than 70 percent of public expenditure in Afghanistan comes from donors and most is spent without government oversight, according to a report that calls for more accountability.

The bypassing of government undermines its authority and development, said the report by nongovernmental group ActionAid Afghanistan released Wednesday.

"Over 72 percent of the total government expenditure in Afghanistan comes from external assistance," it said.

"However three-fourths of the total external assistance is spent directly by donors, and most of it without any reporting to the Afghan government."

The report, "Gaps in Aid Accountability", calls for urgent efforts to improve the government's own revenue, including through better tax collection.

It notes that donors committed about 19.9 billion dollars between 2002 and 2006 but only 14.7 billion was disbursed.

And the government's flagship community development project, National Solidarity Programme which is said to reach 22,000 villages, faced a shortfall of 87 percent for this year, it said.

The Afghan government and some of its partners have been urging donors to direct more of their aid through the government's budget but there are concerns about corruption and mismanagement of funds.
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Pakistan Hunts for Envoy Missing Near Border With Afghanistan
By Ed Johnson
Feb. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Pakistan is hunting for its ambassador to Kabul who disappeared four days ago in a tribal region near the Afghan border, the Foreign Office said, adding nobody has claimed responsibility for abducting him.

The government can't confirm reports that Taliban gunmen seized Tariq Azizuddin and are demanding a top rebel commander be released in exchange, spokesman Muhammad Sadiq told reporters in the capital, Islamabad, yesterday, the official Associated Press of Pakistan reported.

The ambassador was traveling with his driver and security guard to the Afghan capital from Pakistan's northwestern city of Peshawar when he disappeared in the Khyber district, Sadiq said, adding it was ``normal practice'' for diplomats to make such a journey by road.

Pakistan has deployed more than 100,000 soldiers in the tribal region to combat Taliban and al-Qaeda gunmen since 2003. The ambassador disappeared on the same day Pakistan's security forces captured Taliban commander Mansoor Dadullah in the southern province of Baluchistan bordering Afghanistan.

Nobody has contacted Pakistan's government demanding Dadullah's released in exchange for the ambassador, Sadiq said.

Dadullah was wanted for his role in attacks on U.S. and North Atlantic Treaty Organization soldiers in neighboring Afghanistan. He is the brother of the late Mullah Dadullah, the Taliban military commander who was killed in May in an operation led by U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

U.S. intelligence officials say that al-Qaeda has established a haven in Pakistan's tribal regions.
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Taliban denies kidnapping Pakistani envoy
Feb 13, 2008 06:08 EST
ISLAMABAD, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Pakistan's Taliban militants said on Wednesday they would not attack next week's general election and denied involvement in the disappearance of the country's ambassador to neighbouring Afghanistan.

Fears of violence ahead of the Feb. 18 poll have risen since the assassination of opposition leader, Benazir Bhutto, on Dec. 27. More than 400 people have been killed in clashes between troops and militants and bomb attacks since the start of 2008.

"Our central leadership have decided that as we have nothing to do with the elections, therefore there would be no attacks from our people," Pakistan Taliban spokesman Maulvi Omar told Reuters.

"Neither do we support the process of the election nor do we have any opposition to it and if any attack takes place before or on election day, our mujahid won't be involved in it," he said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

Omar is a spokesman for Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Pakistani Taliban and prime suspect for Bhutto's assassination, though Mehsud has denied any involvement.

The spokesman announced a unilateral Taliban ceasefire a week ago. Pakistan's military denied a truce had been agreed but there has been a lull in fighting since then.

The Pakistani Taliban also denied having anything to do with the disappearance of Tariq Azizuddin, Pakistan's ambassador in Kabul who went missing two days ago on his way to the Afghan capital from the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar.

"We have no links with it. We don't know anything about that," Omar said.

Pakistani security forces are searching the area and officials are reluctant to say if Azizuddin has been kidnapped, though Afghan President Hamid Karzai said the envoy had been taken hostage.

Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said it had no further information on the case and again denied media reports that the Taliban had demanded the release of captured Afghan Taliban commander Mullah Mansour Dadullah in exchange for the envoy.

The envoy was travelling through the Khyber tribal region and had been due to change cars at the frontier crossing but he never reached the border. His driver and bodyguard are also missing.

The historic Khyber Pass is the gateway on the main road to landlocked Afghanistan from northwestern Pakistan.

Khyber is notorious for smugglers and bandits, but unlike other parts of the tribal belt on the Afghan border has been relatively free of violence linked to al Qaeda and the Taliban, though militant activity has picked up in adjoining regions. (Reporting by Kamran Haider; Writing by Jon Hemming; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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Germany may increase Afghanistan troops: paper
BERLIN (Reuters) - Chancellor Angela Merkel's ruling coalition plans to discuss raising the upper limit on the number of troops Germany can send to Afghanistan under its parliamentary mandate, a paper reported on Thursday.

The Frankfurter Rundschau cited unnamed coalition sources as saying an increase of at least 500 troops was expected and that Germany's parliamentary mandate would definitely be changed.

The existing mandate, which expires in mid-October allows Germany to send up to 3,500 soldiers to Afghanistan. The paper said a meeting to discuss the increase would include senior figures in Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) and the Social Democrats (SPD), with whom she shares power. The paper gave no further details.

Germany is under mounting pressure from its NATO allies to boost the number of soldiers it has in Afghanistan and to send them to the more dangerous southern part of the country.

The government denied a magazine report at the weekend which said it was planning to expand the number of soldiers it could send to Afghanistan by 1,000 to 4,500 and broaden their base of operations from the north to the west. The mission is unpopular among most Germans.
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Friend of Pervez flees extremists in Afghanistan
By Jerome Starkey in Kabul The Independent (UK) Thursday, 14 February 2008
A journalist friend of the condemned student Sayed Pervez Kambaksh has fled Afghanistan fearing for his life, after an extremist mob threatened to kill him.

Yahya Najafizada escaped halfway across the world when his name appeared on a blacklist of alleged heretics. The list was compiled by hardline sharia students in Mazar-e Sharif, just days after Pervez was arrested for circulating an article about women's rights.

The university students, backed by the local Ulema, or religious council, published the blacklist after a frenzied demonstration demanding Pervez, 23, face the death penalty.

A closed court of three judges has since met the mob's demands. Pervez's family insist he was denied a defence lawyer and the case has sparked outrage across the globe. More than 84,000 people have signed The Independent's online petition demanding the British Foreign Office lobby for his release. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the United Nations top Human Rights Advocate, and the Nato secretary-general have urged Afghanistan's president, Hamid Karzai to intervene. He has promised that "justice will be done".

But vigilante gangs twice threatened Yahya's home in the centre of the provincial capital, where he used to meet Pervez to discuss civil rights and freedom of speech: "If I didn't leave Afghanistan, they could do with me what they did with Pervez, and other democracy campaigners," Yahya said.

He also received threatening phone calls accusing him of spying for the "nfidels" – the Nato-led coalition in Afghanistan – and of converting to Christianity, which is a capital offence under Islamic sharia.

Terrified for his own safety, the young reporter set off for Kabul along treacherous mountain passes usually closed in the winter because of snow. But there was no let up in the campaign of intimidation.

"Extremists threatened me several times via mobile phone, sms, and twice some unknown people came to my house asking for me.

"They held a demonstration against us and after demonstrations they made the blacklist. It was a list of journalists, poets and students of Balkh University. Most of them critical of government."

Yahya, 22, fled to neighbouring Pakistan, and from there to Norway, where he is still in hiding. He fears the extremists may still target his friends and family.

"I don't trust the police to protect me," he said. "Fundamentalists are working in high places in the Afghan government and police. They are against democracy and human rights in Afghanistan."

Yahya was working for a Nato-owned newspaper called Voice of Freedom. But even his international paymasters offered him no protection from the religious wing. "It is difficult for ISAF [the International Security Assistance Force] to deal with the extremists who are the majority of Afghan People about this issue. I spoke with my supervisors and the people who are working for ISAF security, but they didn't promise to protect me."

The death sentence on Pervez was endorsed by Afghanistan's senate and more than 100 religious and tribal elders who rallied in eastern Afghanistan's tribal belt, to demand President Karzai refrain from using his executive powers of pardon. Yahya fears Pervez could yet face the gallows and he urged the international community to continue its campaign to secure his release.

He said: "He is a friend. We have the same ideology of having equal rights in our society of men and women. All the countries and international organisations who are claiming that they support freedom of speech and democracy in Afghanistan should force the Afghan government to save him... from hanging."
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Afghans fall for women’s football
(FIFA.com) Thursday 14 February 2008
When German overseas coach Klaus Stark brought his Afghan women's national team to the Ruit Sports Academy outside Stuttgart for a late-January training camp, he must have felt he had entered a different world. "It's never happened to me before, cameras everywhere and flashbulbs popping. I feel like Joachim Low," he quipped as the media went into a frenzy over the unusual visitors. Stark was far from alone in finding the 12-day stay a whole new experience.

For 18 young women, it was a long yearned-for opportunity to develop their football skills without a care in the world and away from the long shadow of terrorism. "We're here to show that football for girls should be regarded as normal in Afghanistan. And we want to prove there's another way of doing things. The girls love their football, and they want to live normal lives," the 54-year-old Stark told FIFA.com. "Our training camp here is ultimately intended as a symbol of peace."

'We're by no means done yet'

The situation could hardly be more different in Afghanistan, where playing for the women's national team is a genuinely risky business. "It could be stopped at any time. We hope the Taliban don't suddenly decide to ban our activities," says Stark, who long ago came to terms with the dangerous nature of his work in Kabul. "You do what has to be done," he declares. Understandably, all training sessions are held behind closed doors at the site occupied by the international peacekeeping force.

Stark's resolute endurance in an environment fraught with almost unimaginable difficulties is fuelled by deep-rooted idealism and seemingly boundless enthusiasm. "We're by no means done here yet," he revealed to FIFA.com. "The progress we're making in both structural and sporting terms is a daily motivation. It's a fabulous job. The reward is the look on the girls' faces when they're focused on the game, the sparkle in their eyes. Sometimes I just look at what's happening and find myself lost for words and choking back the emotion. They're very moving moments. We watched the girls enjoy every minute of their trip to Germany."

Developing structures and standards

Stark, one of around 30 German FA (DFB) overseas coaches, is now in his fifth year nurturing the grassroots in Afghanistan. Together with his partner Ali Asker Lali, an Afghan native who lived for 25 years in Germany, he has succeeded in awakening an extraordinary passion for women's football in the shadow of the Hindu Kush mountains, and has also begun establishing a structural framework for the game.

"We have fairly wide-ranging goals. We simply want to establish the game in Afghanistan. That involves training coaches and having a system of player passes, for example. We've attracted some 2,000 youngsters as active players," relates Stark with a touch of pride. An Afghan men's national team came into being three years ago. Office-based association duties are a daily necessity, but Stark feels the real priority lies elsewhere: "We must never lose sight of the roots."

Dream of international fixture

At the moment, the Afghan girls are acclimatising to the switch from a small-sized playing area to the full field of play, as eleven-a-side matches are impossible on the solitary reduced-size pitch available in Kabul, another reason the stay at the Ruit Sports Academy was so valuable. "But there's much more to it than that" explained Stark, offering specific thanks to FIFA, the German Foreign Ministry, The German Olympic Federation and the DFB for their continuing support. "It was a chance for the girls to see and absorb a different culture. And it was about raising awareness and sending out a signal, so the media interest was vital."

"My work here may finish for the time being at the end of the year, as we may hand over the project in its entirety to the local association. We'd then come back in two or three years and see what's happened," Stark said, although he retains lofty ambitions for his remaining time in the country. "Our dream is to stage an official international fixture involving our girls."

Perhaps Saudi Arabia could provide the opposition. After all, a short time ago, Prince Mohammad-bin-Fahd University and Al-Yamamah College contested the nation's first-ever women's fixture.
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The Taliban: Kidnappng, Inc.
MSNBC / February 13, 2008
By NBC News' Iqbal Sapand in Kabul, Afghanistan and Carol Grisanti in Islamabad, Pakistan

Malalai Ishaqzai was anxious to tell her story.

"The Taliban kidnapped my 21-year-old son Mustafa," she said. "They demanded a ransom of $200,000 or else they said they would kill him," she told NBC News. "Then they ordered me to give up my job."
Ishaqzai, 36, is the mother of seven and, as a member of the Afghan parliament, one of the few female politicians in this male-dominated society. She is a prominent figure and well-known in the Afghan capital.

News of the kidnapping recently surfaced and had become a hot conversation topic in Kabul.

NBC News went to visit Ishaqzai at her home in an upscale Kabul neighborhood. The family lives well, at least by Afghan standards. An antique red Bokhara carpet covered the entire length of the living room in their fourth-floor apartment. It was bitter cold outside, but it had finally stopped snowing, and it was warm inside thanks to a gas heater.

A houseboy brought tea and Ishaqzai began to tell her story.

Horrific story

"One evening, my son, Mustafa, and his friend, Nek, decided to drive from our home in Kandahar back to Kabul – about a seven-hour drive," Ishaqzai said in a quiet voice as she recalled the story.

"Near the Liwanai Bazaar in Ghazni province, about half way to Kabul – at exactly the same place where the 23 South Korean missionaries were abducted last year – six men brandishing Kalashnikovs stopped their car, checked the license plates and asked which one was Mustafa. Then they wanted to know where I was," she said.

Mustafa had come into the room by now to join us and interrupted his mother. He was clean-shaven and dressed in Western clothes; he seemed to be still in shock.

"Some men, with their faces covered, were standing on the road and aimed a gun at my car," he said. "I had to stop."

"They checked my license plate numbers against a piece of paper which one of them was carrying. I heard one of them say, ‘The numbers match,’" Mustafa said. "They were looking specifically for me."

"‘I am Mustafa,’ I said. And then I asked them, ‘Who are you?’"

At this point Mustafa looked over at his mother, who began to cry.

"They slapped me twice on my face and said, ‘We are Taliban. Where is Malalai?’" he said, referring to his mother.

Big business

Kidnapping for ransom has become a big propaganda business for the Taliban and a seemingly sure road to easy money. The money raised from ransoms paid goes toward purchasing weapons and funding the insurgency.

Shortly after 23 South Koreans were kidnapped by Taliban militants as they traveled by bus from Kabul to Kandahar on July 19, the South Korean government entered into direct talks with the Taliban.

More than six weeks after the kidnapping, a deal was reached in which the South Korean government reaffirmed a promise to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan by the end of the 2007. Seoul also said it would prevent South Korean Christian missionaries from working in the staunchly Islamic country, something it had already promised to do.

Some reports said that a ransom of $10 million was paid for the release of the group, but the South Korean government denies the charge and said no money changed hands to secure the hostages release.

The deal reached between the Taliban and the South Koreans was a big win for the Taliban. It gave the militant group the recognition and power it craves and increased their political legitimacy by showing they could negotiate successfully with a foreign government.

South Korea is not the only country accused of paying for the release of hostages. Germany, France and Italy have all reportedly paid huge sums to the Taliban to secure the release of prisoners.

No mercy

Ishaqzai was well aware that the Taliban show no restraint, and typically behead their captives when their demands are not met.

"I kept calling his phone," she said. "Finally someone picked up and told me my son had an accident and couldn't speak."

By now, Ishaqzai knew that something terrible had happened. She left Kabul and went back home to Kandahar, her ancestral home, in the southeast of the country. The city is also the home and the spiritual base of the Taliban. She begged local officials in Kandahar to intervene. But no one was able, or willing, to help her.

"Five days went by and finally I got a call from my son's phone," she said.

"‘I am Mullah Abdullah Jan Mansoor,’" Ishaqzai said the caller introduced himself. "‘I am the man who has kidnapped your son. If you want him and his friend back alive, you have to do as I tell you.’"

Ishaqzai knew she was speaking to the same person who had kidnapped the South Korean missionaries.

The Taliban demanded that all their people be freed from the government jails or else her son and his friend would die. Ishaqzai took the demands to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, but he refused to intervene. Karzai has come under intense criticism in the West for negotiating with the Taliban and bowing to their demands.

She then went to her tribal elders in Kandahar who contacted the Taliban and worked out a deal for the release of the boys.

"My tribal elders convinced them I could not pay such a huge amount and that it was very important for our tribe that I represent them in parliament," Ishaqzai said. "In the end, my brother paid $100,000, but only my son was released."

Mustafa's friend Nek was beheaded before his eyes.

"They made me watch them do it," Mustafa said, "I saw his blood and then I fainted. I miss my friend; it is all my fault that he is dead."
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Liberals back away from compromise on troops
Party sends mixed signals a day after a deal with the Conservatives on the future role of the Kandahar battle group seemed in hand
CAMPBELL CLARK, From Thursday's Globe and Mail February 14, 2008
OTTAWA — The Liberals' position on Afghanistan became mired in confusion yesterday when the party's defence critic, Denis Coderre, suggested they want to withdraw the Canadian Forces' main battle group in Kandahar, but other MPs in his party disagreed.

One day after Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion opened the door to compromise with the government by proposing an extension of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan, but under a new mandate, Liberals insisted there was still a huge gap to be bridged and Prime Minister Stephen Harper appeared less committed to ending the mission in 2011.

Liberal MP Pablo Rodriguez complained that Mr. Harper misrepresented the Liberal proposal to change the mission by ending the "combat" role as support for extending the existing one.

On Tuesday, Mr. Dion proposed that the mission be extended to 2011 under a new mandate to move away from combat toward training the Afghan National Army and providing security for reconstruction efforts. But he said military commanders would decide what fighting was necessary.

Like the government, he called for NATO to send additional troops - he was not clear on how many. But Mr. Dion said that under his proposal those new troops would take over the current tasks of Canadians, so they could focus on training and security.

Yesterday, Mr. Coderre said the difference is that the Conservatives want reinforcements to conduct "business as usual," while the Liberals want replacements so Canadians can do a different type of mission.
When asked whether the Canadian battle group would stay in Kandahar under the Liberal proposal, he said: "No. Not in my book."

"If you really want to have a rotation, it's not to take all the troops and put them in one place, it's to make sure that we will have some that we will be able to recuperate."

He suggested the Liberal position would require at least 800 more NATO troops to take on the tasks of the battle group, separate from the 1,000 reinforcements that John Manley's panel on Afghanistan recommended.

The Canadian Forces' battle group in Kandahar, about 1,200 troops, is the main operations unit for Canada's effort in securing the province.

Removing them, or the 800 infantry soldiers to whom Mr. Coderre referred, would mean slashing the Canadian mission, and the Conservatives would be unlikely to accept that condition.

There about 2,500 Canadian Forces troops in Afghanistan, but many are in command, support and training units, and about 300 provide security for the provincial reconstruction team, or PRT, in Kandahar.
Mr. Coderre was vague when asked whether he meant that the battle group's numbers would be redeployed within Afghanistan or sent home, but said he expects it would be a combination of both.

"The battle group, should we put them to PRTs and to training? I think that we need to recuperate, too, so we'll have to refocus about what does it mean in the status of our troops regarding the mission."

Other Liberals disagreed. Liberal MP Keith Martin, who was deeply involved in caucus discussions on the Liberal position, said the party is not suggesting the battle group be withdrawn.

"That's not what Mr. Dion is saying at all," he said. "The battle group is involved, and is doing an excellent job of training the Afghan police and army and providing security for development projects, and assistance to our allies."

Mr. Coderre also appeared to differ from Mr. Dion by arguing that it would be inappropriate to head into an election before Parliament has decided on the future of the Afghan mission.

Mr. Dion said Tuesday it would be "irresponsible" for the government to hold a vote on Afghanistan before the Feb. 26 budget, and many Liberals believe their leader wants to trigger an election on the budget vote.

And Mr. Dion applied the brakes to talk that a deal is close. He said that while Mr. Harper suggested he was moving toward the Liberals, his answers in the Commons did not provide reassurance.

When asked whether he would commit to ending the Canadian mission in 2011, Mr. Harper said he will examine the Liberal proposal, but that both parties want to end the mission "around 2011."

"I think we are also clear in our motion, as is the Liberal Party, that the mission should continue beyond 2009, and that we are both seeking an end to the mission around 2011," the Prime Minister said.
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Tories offer new Afghan role plan
February 14, 2008 – Toronto Star, ALLAN WOODS OTTAWA BUREAU
OTTAWA–The Conservative government is willing to sit down with the Liberals to co-write a motion to extend the Afghan mission, a senior government official says.

The Tories are drafting a new proposal to extend the engagement until 2011 that will be presented "in the next few days" for a debate in the House of Commons and a vote, likely next month.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper accepted the broad strokes of a Liberal proposal to begin pulling Canadian troops out of Kandahar on Feb. 1, 2011, and put the focus of the mission after next February on training Afghan soldiers, securing development projects and delivering aid and assistance out of a military outpost on the outskirts of Kandahar city.

Under the Liberal plan, the last Canadian troops would leave Kandahar by July 2011.

The Liberal plan came in the form of proposed amendments to a Tory motion to extend Parliament's mandate for the Kandahar mission from next February to the end of 2011.

The extension would be dependent on getting about 1,000 more troops from NATO to help out as well as more equipment.

The government official was commenting after the Liberals came under criticism for giving too much ground to the government in an attempt to reach a compromise on the mission extension.

"Our position is very clear and we're very united around this position. I'm just saying that maybe we weren't clear enough in communicating it, so we should be clear," said Liberal MP Pablo Rodriguez (Honoré-Mercier), who presented the concern at a caucus meeting.

The Liberals had been demanding that Canada's combat role end in February 2009 as a condition of their support for the extension, but the party's amendment makes no mention of the non-combat restrictions.

Instead, it stipulates that Canadian soldiers concentrate on training, reconstruction and security, and Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion said it is up to military commanders to decide how far they can go in carrying out those functions.

A brief collegial tone in the Commons disappeared yesterday as the Liberals lashed out at the government, demanding to know if they would consent to ending the mission outright in 2011 and force NATO to find another country to lead the fight against the Taliban.

"The ball is in the court of the government," said Dion. "The Prime Minister said that he is coming to our position so we tested that ... and we received no answer."

While Harper is willing to give the Liberals input into a new compromise position, Dion has said he would avoid negotiating with Harper behind closed doors.

The Tories already carry out too many aspects of the Afghan mission in secret, he has said. "Furthermore, the government has our proposed amendment. That is our position," said Leslie Swartman, a spokesperson for the Liberal leader.

"At some point this government will have to come up with an original thought on Afghanistan instead of relying on advice from an independent panel and opposition parties. They should simply accept our amendments and call it a night."
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